At Washington, D.C. Auto Show, Honda said that it will begin retail leasing of the new 5-passenger, hydrogen-powered Clarity Fuel Cell sedan (earlier post) to customers in select California markets before the end of 2016. Honda expects to price the Clarity Fuel Cell at around $60,000 with a targeted monthly lease under $500.

Honda expects limited volumes in the early stages of production. Deliveries will begin through certified fuel cell vehicle dealers in Los Angeles and Orange counties as well as the San Francisco Bay Area and Sacramento. The company will start by leasing vehicles and expects to move to retail sales with increased volumes and market coverage coincident with increasing vehicle supplies and the growing hydrogen refueling station network.

The Clarity Fuel Cell will anchor an expanding portfolio of advanced environmental Honda vehicles, including a reengineered 2017 Accord Hybrid, going on-sale this spring, and a new Honda Plug-In Hybrid vehicle based on the same platform as the Clarity Fuel Cell, slated for launch by 2018.

The new Clarity Fuel Cell and Accord Hybrid arriving this year, along with the new plug-in hybrid coming by 2018, are critical steps toward a new generation of Honda advanced environmental vehicles and a true volume pillar for Honda and our product portfolio in the US.

Honda engineers created a fuel cell stack that is 33% more compact than its predecessor with a 60% increase in power density compared to the outgoing Honda FCX Clarity. The more compact fuel cell and integrated powertrain, comparable in size to a V-6 engine, now fits entirely under the hood of the car, allowing for a more spacious cabin with seating for five passengers.

The new Honda Clarity Fuel Cell will feature a driving range estimated to exceed 300 miles (483 km), with an anticipated refueling time of approximately three to five minutes.

As the next progression in Honda’s dynamic FCV styling, the Honda Clarity Fuel Cell features a low, wide aerodynamic body with clean character lines. Features include the Honda Sensing suite of safety and driver assistive technologies, Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, LED exterior lighting and 18-inch aluminum alloy wheels. The Clarity Fuel Cell will be available in black, white and signature red exterior paint schemes.

Next-generation plug-in hybrid .
In addition, the platform underpinning the Clarity Fuel Cell will serve as the base for a next-generation Honda plug-in hybrid launching in the US by 2018. This will be a new, 50-state volume vehicle in the Honda lineup-up. Featuring a second iteration of the i-MMD plug-in system that offers significant improvements in battery capacity and power, the next-generation Honda plug-in hybrid will more than triple the 13-mile (21 km) all-electric range of the previous Accord Plug-In Hybrid Sedan. This much greater all electric range will enable a zero emissions commute for the vast majority of American drivers with EV operation at highway speeds.

Hydrogen refueling station network. In the effort to speed the advancement of a refueling station network outside of California, in May 2013 American Honda joined the public-private partnership H2USA, which brings together automakers, government agencies, hydrogen suppliers, and the hydrogen and fuel cell industries to coordinate research and identify cost-effective solutions to deploy stations that can deliver affordable, clean hydrogen fuel in the United States.

Additionally, in an effort to support the wider introduction of fuel cell vehicles, Honda in 2014 committed $13.8 million in financial support to FirstElement Fuel to accelerate the building of additional hydrogen refueling stations throughout the state of California.

In June 2013, Honda entered into a long-term collaborative agreement with General Motors to co-develop the next-generation of fuel cell systems and hydrogen storage technologies, aiming for the 2020 timeframe. The collaboration expects to succeed by sharing technological expertise, economies of scale and other benefits.

Comments

There's no Bigger Failure then the CARB Hydrogen boondoggle.

Hydrogen Summary of Failure

Hydrogen stations make excellent explosive terrorist targets.
Hydrogen stations are very expensive, cost per station: $1.5 Million, who is going to be forced to pay for this?
Hydrogen stations not pumping at the 10,000 psi required, you’re only getting Half Charges!

Difficult to make hydrogen and store it.
Hydrogen isn’t a source of energy, you can’t mine it, you can convert something else to hydrogen, like methane, but then you lose energy in the process.
Hydrogen from water( in a global drought? ), is extremely inefficient.
Hydrogen from methane gives you No Help with global warming, it actually makes things worse. As methane wells typically leak like sieves
Hydrogen must be supercooled and compressed to 10,000 psi to store sufficient energy, which requires lots of energy.
Burning it as a fuel is less than 50% efficient.
The energy to do all this could be used to directly run an EV from a battery, and get you Twice as far.
Hydrogen likes to leak.
Hydrogen has a general problem of metal embrittlement, so you need special tanks.
- Hydrogen tanks only certified for 15 years???

Hydrogen leaks as an invisible gas.
Hydrogen is extremely flammable with an invisible flame.
Right now hydrogen is a loser vs. current batteries, not to speak of the battery chemistry in the coming solid state batteries.
Chevy Volt gets better MPG, at a Lower Price, and allows you to use cheap solar energy for your fuel, and hydrogen does not. We will not run out of gas during the EV conversion process.
Platinum in the fuel cell = expensive.

Hydrogen time refueling vs. solar.
Solar: You plug in at your home, Time 60 seconds.
Hydrogen: You drive 20 minutes, or to California, to the station 10 minute refuel, 20 minutes back home: 50 minutes lost.

Hydrogen Cars were built on the premise that we’d need a "Bridge Fuel" to EV’s, however battery tech has advanced so rapidly that there is no need for a bridge, especially one as wasteful and expensive as this.

A single H2 fueling station can service 36 cars per day. (The highest volume ones service between 24-36 FCEVs.) Compare to ordinary gas stations, which service an average of ~1100 cars per day (some say 2500/day).

@Mike999,
If you truly believe that Hydrogen is really as bad as you've just elaborately posted, then why would you even bother to waste such effort for nothing?
Only someone fearing that Hydrogen will be taking away market share from their competing technology would bother to post so much against Hydrogen.

@ECI,
Believe it or not, Hydrogen can be transported in existing NG distributing piping at even 100% concentration. Future H2 stations will simply use H2 in the piping and compress it at night for dispensing during the day.

@Roger what are you basing this speculation about hydrogen pipelines on? It's just more fantasy with no credible information to base the conjecture on. The hydrogen comes from where? Distributed to where? Oh yes, I remember. Distribution warehouses in the industrial section of town. That's your solution.

It's simply untrue that hydrogen can be pumped through existing NG pipelines. Totally false. And you know it.

DOE estimates that it will cost $500 billion to $1 trillion to build a Hydrogen fueling infrastructure in the US.

Fueling stations can make hydrogen at the point of fueling, natural gas to hydrogen facilities do not take up much room.
There are 60 hydrogen fueling stations in California, with 40 of them in southern California. With the new PFCEV coming, the customer will not have to fill up very often.

Producing, storing and delivering clean affordable H2 will be done in the near future. Early H2 stations may need more subsidies but that's is what we may have to pay to reduce GHGs, pollution and Oil wars.

The same initial purchase subsidies ($3K to $15K) should apply to both BEVs and FCEVs. The size of the subsidy could be based on all weather non-polluting 'range' per fill.

At the rate of $30 per mile? A TESLA model S90 would get 30 x 300 = $9K; a Bolt about 30 x 160 = $4.8K; a Leaf about 30 x 96 = $2.88K; most PHEVs would get about 30 x 40 = $1.2K and most FCEVs would get 30 x 500 = $15K etc.

Another way to promote clean running vehicles would be to reduce or remove purchase taxes, yearly registration fees and free or reduced parking.

What SJC said. PHEV's, once widespread, will use little fuel, whether gasoline or hydrogen. Most mileage for most people will be on battery. So the need for and distribution of filling stations will change dramatically in the next decade. Some, if not all, will dispense hydrogen.

SJC, there are definitely not 60 hydrogen stations in California. If there were, Toyota would not have pulled the Mirai off sale, or deployed mobile hydrogen tanker trailers prior to that stop sale order.

The number of retail H2 stations in California that can fully fuel Mirai is between 4-8, depending on which ones are operating on any given day.

H2 stations currently being built, or in the planning and permitting stages, as many on that list are, will be of very little use to someone who takes delivery of an FCV today. Many of those stations will not be open until two years or more.

I guess if you're going to include hydrogen stations that exist only as blueprints in your list of California H2 stations, you can claim as many as you'd like.

People who pay $57,500 for a car generally expect a bit more reality than that in order to get to work, the grocery store or a nice evening out.

Battery replacement is a red herring. BEV powertrains, including batteries, have long warranties. I notice you never post links to sources on that claim, SJC.

But nice of you to bring it up in an attempt to distract from the fact that you claimed there were 60 hydrogen stations in California, and included in that number at least 24 that have not yet even broken ground. Yep, that kind of disinformation will do wonders for your credibility.